Archive for the ‘tips’ category

SQL Sentry just announced that the PRO version of Plan Explorer is now completely free – as in you don’t even have to register to use it. (For those in the know, there used to be two versions: a ‘lighter-weight’ free version, and a paid-for PRO version; they’ve now consolidated all features into the PRO version – and made it free.)

Spoil Yourself with Better Insight and Analysis

I’ll be honest: since I spend so much of my time on my clients’ machines when analyzing performance problems and looking at execution plans, I’ve made a conscious effort in the past to avoid using Plan Explorer too much in my Lab – for fear of spoiling myself.

SQL Sentry’s Motivation

It doesn’t take a genius to see that SQL Sentry is trying to use Plan Explorer PRO to establish a ‘foot in the door’ with as many potential customers and clients as possible.

But a maneuver like this only works with a market when you’re providing something that users REALLY want, management can easily see the value being offered, and the tool being offered is really solid (non-buggy).

While there are tons of undocumented T-SQL commands out there, one of my all-time favorites is this little gem:

SELECT SERVERPROPERTY('ErrorLogFileName');

It’s not much, but it will show you default details on:

Where the SQL Server Binaries have been installed

Where you can find SQL Server’s log files (as .txt files)

Where the default trace (.trc) files are located

Arguably, there are better ways to retrieve some of this information (like SELECT * FROM sys.dm_server_registry;).

But SERVERPROPERTY(‘ErrorLogFileName’) works just fine when looking for low-level details.

The only real problem I have with this particular snippet of T-SQL is that I can never remember EXACTLY what the property is to ‘search’ for (i.e., ‘ErrorLogFileName’) – which is part of why I’ve blogged about it (so that I’ll be able to more easily find this snippet in the future).